Bishop of Hexham and afterwards of York; b. at Harpham, in the East Riding of Yorkshire;
d. at Beverley, 7 May, 721. In early life lie was under the care of Archbishop Theodore, at Canterbury, who supervised his education, and is reputed to have given him the name of John. He became a member
of the Benedictine Order, and for a time was an inmate of St. Hilda'smonastery at Streaneshaleh (Whitby). Afterwards he won renown as a preacher, displayed
marked erudition in expounding Scripture, and taught amongst other subjects. On
25 August, 687 was consecratedBishop of Hexham, a district with which he was not unfamiliar, as he had for a period
led a life of retreat at Erneshowe (Herneshou), on the opposite bank of the
Tyne. Here, too, he was afterwards wont to resort for seclusion, especially
during Lent, when the cares of his episcopal ministration permitted of his so
doing. John was present at the synod on the Nidd in 705, convened by Osred,
King of Northumbria, to decide on Wilfrid's case. In the same year (703), on
the death of Bosa, John was translated to York after eighteen years of labour in the See of Hexham, where he was succeeded by Wilfrid. Of his new
activity little is known beyond that he was diligent in visitation, considerate
towards the poor, and exceedingly attentive to the training of students whom he
maintained under his personal charge. His little company of pupils is said to
have included: Bede, whom he ordained; Berethume, afterwards Abbot of Beverley; Herebald, Abbot of Tynemouth; and Wilfrid "the Younger", John's successor
(718) in the See of York. Having purchased a place called Inderawood, to which
a later age has given the name of Beverley, John established a monastery there and also handsomely endowed the place, which became even in its
founder's day an important ecclesiastical centre. To this monastery of Beverley, after resigning the See of York to his pupil Wilfrid, John retired and
spent the remainder of his life with Abbot Berethune, a one time favourite
scholar. In 1037 he was canonized by Benedict IX; His bones were translated by Ælfric, Archbishop of York, and placed in a costly shrine. A second translation took place in
1197. The remains were discovered in 1664 and again brought to light in 1736. (See BEVERLEY MINSTER.)

THIS illustrious
saint was born at Harpham, a village in the province of the Deiri, which
comprised Yorkshire, Lancashire, and the rest of the kingdom of the
Northumbers, on the south side of the Tyne; what lay beyond it being called
Bernicia. An earnest desire of qualifying himself for the service of God, drew
him young into Kent, where he made great progress in learning and piety, in the
famous school of St. Theodorus, the archbishop, under the direction of the holy
abbot Adrian. 1 Afterwards
returning into his own country, he pursued the exercises of piety in the
monastery of men under St. Hilda, at Whitby; till in the beginning of the reign
of king Alfred, upon the death of Eata, he was made bishop of Hagulstad, or
Hexam. What time he had to spare from his functions he consecrated to heavenly
contemplation; retiring for that purpose into the church-yard of St. Michael’s,
beyond the river Tyne, about a mile and a half from Hagulstad, especially
during the forty days of Lent. He was accustomed to take with him some poor
person, whom he served during that time. Once in the beginning of a Lent, he
took with him a dumb youth, who never had been able to utter one word, and
whose head was covered with hideous scabs and scales, without any hair. The
saint caused a mansion to be built for this sick youth within his inclosure,
and often admitted him into his own cell. On the second Sunday he made the sign
of the cross upon his tongue, and loosed it. Then he taught him to say Gea,
which signifies in Saxon Yea, or Yes; then the letters of the
alphabet, A, B, C, and afterwards syllables and words. Thus the youth
miraculously obtained his speech. Moreover, by the saint’s blessing the
remedies prescribed by a physician whom he employed, his head was entirely
healed, and became covered with hair. When St. Wilfrid returned from
banishment, St. John yielded up to him the see of Hagulstad: but some time
after, upon the death of Bosa, a man of great sanctity and humility, as Bede
testifies, he was placed in the archiepiscopal chair of York. Venerable Bede,
who received the holy orders of deacon and priest from his hands, gives ample
testimony to his sanctity; and relates the instantaneous cure of the sick wife
of a neighbouring thane or lord, by holy water, and several other miracles
performed by him, from the testimony of Bercthun, abbot of Beverley, and
Herebald, abbot of Tinmouth, who had been eye-witnesses to several of them. St.
John made frequent retirement his delight, to renew thereby his spirit of
devotion, lest the dissipation of exterior employs should extinguish it. He
chose for his retreat a monastery, which he had built at Beverley, then a
forest, now a market-town, twenty-seven miles from York. This monastery,
according to the custom of those times, he erected for the use of both sexes,
and put it under the government of his disciple, Bercthun, or Brithun, first
abbot of Beverley, then called Endeirwood, or wood of the Deiri. In 717, being
much broken with age and fatigues, he resigned his bishopric to his chaplain,
St. Wilfrid the younger, and having ordained him bishop of York, he retired to
Beverley, where he spent the remaining four years of his life in the punctual
performance of all monastic duties. He died there the death of the just, on the
7th of May, 721. His successor governed the see of York fifteen years, was a
great lover of the beauty of God’s house, and is named among the saints, April
the 29th. The monastery of Beverley having been destroyed by the Danes, king
Athelstan, who had obtained a great victory over the Scots, by the intercession
of St. John, founded in his honour, in the same place, a rich collegiate church
of canons. King Henry V. attributed to the intercession of this saint the
glorious victory of Agincourt, on which occasion a synod, in 1416, ordered his
festival to be solemnly kept over all England.2 Henschenius the
Bollandist, in the second tome of May, has published four books of the miracles
wrought at the relics of Saint John of Beverley, written by eye-witnesses.3 His sacred
bones were honourably translated into the church by Alfric, archbishop of York,
in 1037: a feast in honour of which translation was kept at York on the 25th of
October. On the 13th of September, (not the 24th as Mr. Stevens says,) in 1664,
the sexton, digging a grave in the church of Beverley, discovered a vault of
freestone, in which was a box of lead, containing several pieces of bones, with
some dust, yielding a sweet smell; with inscriptions, by which it appeared that
these were the mortal remains of St. John of Beverley, as we read in Dugdale’s
History of the Collegiate Church of Beverley, who has transcribed them, p. 57.
These relics had been hid in the beginning of the reign of king Edward VI.
Dugdale and Stevens testify, that they were all reinterred in the middle-alley
of the same church. Alcuin4 had an
extraordinary devotion to St. John of Beverley, and in his poem on the saints
of York, published by Thomas Gale, gives a long history of the miracles wrought
by him from verse 1085 to 1215. Rabanus Maurus has placed Alcuin in his
Martyrology on the 19th of May, and Henschenius on that day gives his life, and
mentions several private Martyrologies in which his name is found, though he
has never been any where honoured in the office of the Church.5 On St. John of
Beverley, see Bede, Hist. l. 5. c. 2. &c. his life compiled by Folcard,
monk of Canterbury, published by Henschenius, with other monuments, t. 2. Maij, p. 168. F. Edw. Maihew, &c.

Note 4. Alcuin, or Alcwine, that is, Allwin, (the same name in
the original Saxon as Victor, and Vincentius in Latin; Nicetas and Nicephorus
in Greek,) was a native of York, as he himself declares in his poem on the
saints of that diocess. Foreigners not being accustomed to pronounce the w,
he omitted it in his name; which he mollified into Albinus, prefixing to it in
France the name of Flaccus. In his letters, he often styles himself Flaccus
Albinus, never Albinus Flaccus, as many moderns falsely call him. Alcuin was
nobly born, became a monk at York, and was made deacon of that church. He
learned Latin, Greek, and the elements of the Hebrew language, and went through
the sacred studies under Egbert and Elbert, who taught a great school in that
city till they were successively placed in the archiepiscopal chair. When
Elbert succeeded Egbert in that dignity, in 766, he committed to Alcuin the
care of the school, and of the great library belonging to that church. Eanbald,
succeeding his uncle Elbert, sent Alcuin to Rome, to bring over his pall, in
780. Charlemagne, king of France, afterwards emperor, meeting him at Parma,
earnestly desired to detain him; but the canons obliged him to return to his
own church. However, that prince prevailed with the King of Northumberland and
the Archbishop of York to send him back into France. He appointed him to open a
great school in his own palace, and generally assisted in person at his
lessons, with the princes, his sons, and other lords. He also, by his advice,
instituted an academy in his palace, consisting of many learned men, who met on
certain days to discourse on points of sacred learning. In this academy, Alcuin
took the name of Flaccus from Horace, the king that of David, Adelard of Corbie
that of Augustine, &c. The king sent Alcuin, his ambassador to King Offa,
in 790, to adjust certain differences; he honoured him exceedingly, and usually
called him his master: by his advice he made several literary establishments,
and consulted him in affairs of state. The ingenious Gaillard (Hist, de la
Rivalité de France et l’Anglet. t. 1, p. 73,) says: The wise Alcuin disgusted
Charlemagne from the passion for conquests, by discovering to him a new source
of true greatness, far dearer to humanity. That prince, instructed by such a
master, learned to set a just value on true knowledge: he placed his glory in
protecting science, in perfecting the administration, and in extending, in
every respect, the empire of reason. This it is that has principally rendered
the name of that great prince immortal in the eyes of true judges. This great
man assisted at the council of Francfort, in 794, and at that of
Aix-la-Chapelle, in 799, in which latter he confuted Felix of Urgel, who was
present. Felix and Elipandus, another Spanish bishop, revived the
Demi-Nestorian error, maintaining that Christ, as man, was only the adoptive,
not the natural Son of God. Whence it would follow, that he assumed not
only the human nature, but also a human person: which was the heresy of
Nestorius. Elipandus reproached Alcuin for his riches, and the number of his
vassals. Alcuin discovers his disinterestedness and spirit of poverty in
several letters, as in that to the priest Eata, and in others. Writing to the
Bishop of Lyons, he justifies himself, saying: “Elipandus objects to me my
riches, servants, and vassals, which amount to the number of twenty thousand, not
reflecting that the possession of riches is vicious only from the attachment of
the heart. It is one thing to possess the world, and another to be possessed by
the world. Some possess riches, though perfectly disengaged from them in their
hearts: others, though they enjoy none, yet love and covet them.” These vassals
belonged to the several abbeys of which the king compelled him to undertake the
administration, purely that he might establish in them regular discipline, and
employ the surplus of the revenues in alms, according to the intentions of such
foundations, as Lupus, abbot of Ferriers, (ep. 11,) and the anonymous life of
St. Aldericus, archbishop of Sens, assure us: for the king had made him his
general almoner to relieve the distressed, and appointed him a house for the
reception of strangers. How tedious the hurry of a court is to a lover of
learning or solitude, any one may judge who has read the genuine description of
a court life, in the time of our King Henry II. in Peter of Blois, or John of Salisbury.
Alcuin never ceased to complain of its yoke and the dissipation attending it,
and to solicit the king for leave to retire into some monastery, till at length
he obtained his request. He petitioned to go to that of Fulda, but the king
would by no means consent that he should withdraw to so great a distance from
court: at length he suffered him to retire to that of St. Martin’s at Tours, of
which he had nominated him abbot in 796. He was still obliged often to wait on
the king; and settled the reformation of St. Benedict of Anian in the houses
which were subject to him. He had long alleged his age and feebleness, that he
might be permitted to resign the government of the several great abbeys which
had been committed to his care. At length his tears and entreaties prevailed,
and, according to his earnest desire, he was reduced to the condition of a
private monk, (others say regular canon, for he had secularized St. Martin’s
abbey at Tours, and established canons in it,) some time before his happy death,
which happened at Tours, on the 19th of May, 804, on Whitsunday, as he had
begged of God. See his life in Mabillon, Act. Bened. t. 4, p. 146; also in his
Annals of that Order, b. 25, 27. Ceillier, t. 18, p. 278. Biogr. Britann.
&c.

The best edition of the works of Alcuin was given us by the learned
Andrew Duchesne, in three tomes, in 1617. His comments on the scripture consist
in extracts from the ancient fathers. He has left us the lives of St. Vedast,
St. Martin, St. Riquier, and St. Willibrord. His letters, of which we have one
hundred and fifteen published by Duchesne, sixty-seven by Canisius, several
others by Usher, Baluze, and Mabillon, are curious, and are addressed to
several kings, queens, prelates, and other great men. His moral works breathe a
sincere piety: the dogmatic are solid and close. His doctrine, in all points of
faith, is most pure, and he lets slip no opportunity of exerting his zeal in
its defence. We are promised a new, complete, and accurate edition of the works
of this great man, by a monk of the congregation of St. Vanne. [back]

St. John of Beverley was the Bishop of Hexham, and later of York. He was born in
Harpham, Yorkshire, and died in Beverley on May 7, 721.

As a youth,
John manifested a strong desire to devote his life to God, and eventually left
his native Yorkshire and traveled Kent where he studied at the famous
ecclesiastical school of St. Theodore, archbishop of Canterbury.

He returned
toYorkshire upon the completion of his studies, and joined a Benedictine
monastery where he devoted himself to contemplation. He was called out of his
monastic seclusion to be consecrated as bishop of Hexham in 687, a see he
occupied for 18 years while still managing to devote time to contemplation and
the study of Scripture.

With the
death of St. Bosa, archbishop of York, John was transferred to York and
served there until his retirement from ill health in 717. He spent his
last four years in a monastery that he built at Beverley.

John was
renowned for the miracles that he performed, both during his life and
those that took place after his death. Most famously, he cured a young man who
was dumb and had reportedly never spoken a word in his life, and obtained from
him the ability to speak. He took the young man under his wing and
patiently taught him the alphabet and the fundaments of the language.

After his
death in 721, owing to the many miracles that occurred through his
intercession, his burial site at Beverley became one of the most popular
pilgrimage sites in England. He was canonized by Pope Benedict IX in 1037.

The renowned
English mystic, Julian of Norwich, and the martyred bishop, St. John Fisher,
who was from Beverley, had a great devotion to St. John.

John, better known as St. John of Beverley, studied at Canterbury
under St. Adrian and was later one of St. Hilda's pupils at Whitby. "A
circumstance," says Fuller, " which soundeth something to her honour
and nothing to his disgrace, seeing eloquent Apollo himself learned the primar
of his Christianity partly from Priscilla."

St. John, whose foundation at Beverley became one of the three centres
of Christianity in Deira (the others were York and Ripon), was born of noble
parents at Harpham in the East Riding. At an early age, he began to preach to
the still half-heathen people, arresting their attention by his powerful
eloquence. The Venerable Bede was one of St. John's pupils and was ordained by
him. In August AD 687, John, who had for some time been living in a hermitage
at Harneshow, on the left bank of the Tyne opposite Hexham, was consecrated
Bishop of Hexham, the see which had been established in AD 681. Here, he
remained for eighteen years, during which we know little of his labours or his
life. He was translated to York in AD 705, where he became a favourite with
King Osred and was present at a synod in which many enactments were made for
the better regulation of the Northumbrian Church. He was most diligent in
watching over his monasteries and in attending to the poor and to the company of
pupils always gathered about him. Whilst holding the see of York, John became
the owner of Inderawood, a village on the site of the present town of Beverley,
in his native district. There was already, at Inderawood, a small church
dedicated to St. John the Evangelist. This, the bishop enlarged and established
as a monastery for both sexes (as was then the custom). Numerous gifts were
made to the new foundation and many churches were built in the surrounding
district, then thickly covered with forest. St. John resigned the See of York,
in AD 714, and retired to his monastery at Beverley, where he died on 7th May
AD 721. He was canonised, in 1037, by Pope Benedict IX and, in the same year,
his relies were translated by Archbishop Alfric and deposited in a shrine of
gold. At the Reformation, they were interred in a case of lead which has been
twice exposed to the light - in 1664 and in 1736.

The reputation of St. John of Beverley was greater than that of any
northern saint, apart from St. Cuthbert. Athelstan, on his way into Scotland in
AD 934, visited the shrine and carried off the holy banner of the saint as a
protection to his host, promising that, if he returned victorious, he would
bestow many privileges on the church. He did so accordingly, giving to it its
famous right of sanctuary, and founding a college of secular canons. The
traditional words in which the grant of sanctuary is recorded

"Als fre make I the

As hert may thenk

Or eghe may see"

are certainly very ancient and are mentioned in a confirmation of the
privileges of the church made by King Henry IV.

The Conqueror and Stephen were prevented, by miraculous interference, as
it was alleged, from ravaging the territory of St. John. The banner of Beverley
was one of those which floated over the host of the English at the Battle of
the Standard (1138). Archbishop Edward, like Athelstan, carried it with him
into Scotland. Henry V and his Queen visited the shrine of St. John after the
victory of Agincourt on the festival of his translation; and although St.
Crispin and Crispinian shared the honours of the day, the King attributed the
victory greatly to the intercession of St. John of Beverley.

Edited from Richard John King's
"Handbook to the Cathedrals of England: Northern Division" (1903).

Born in Harpham (Humberside), Yorkshire, England; died at Beverley, England,
May 7, 721; canonized in 1037; feast of translation, October 25. Saint John
trained for the priesthood and monastic life in Kent under the direction of SS.
Adrian and Theodore, but returned to Yorkshire upon completing his studies to
become a monk at Whitby Abbey, which was then under the rule of Saint Hilda.

John founded a monastery in
Humberside, England, on the site of a small church dedicated to Saint John the
Evangelist, where he asked to be buried. In 687, after the death of Saint Eata,
John he was consecrated bishop of Hexham. He is said to have shown special care
for the poor and the handicapped. Whatever time he could spare from his
episcopal duties he spent in contemplation. At regular seasons, especially
during Lent, he retired to pray in a cell by the church of Saint Michael beyond
the Tyne, near Hexham. He would take with him some poor person, whom he would
serve during his retirement.

He was transferred York as
archbishop upon the death of Saint Bosa in 705, and Saint Wilfrid succeeded him
at Hexham as part of the final settlement of the latter's long dispute with the
Northumbrian kings. He continued his practice of periodic retirement for spiritual
refreshment. His chosen retreat was an abbey that he had built at Beverley,
then a forest. Not until old age had worn him out did he resign his office to
Saint Wilfrid the Younger in order to spend the last four years of his life in
the peace of his beloved abbey at Beverley.

According to the Venerable
Bede in Ecclesiastical History, who was ordained both deacon and priest by John
when he was bishop of Hexham, John of Beverley possessed the gift of healing.
He cured a youth of dumbness, even though the boy had never utter a single
word. (The boy was apparently bald from a terrible scalp disease also.) On the
second Sunday of Lent, John made the sign of the cross upon the youth's tongue,
and loosed it. Bede tells of how the saint patiently taught the boy the
alphabet. He taught him to say "gea," which signifies in Saxon
"Yea"; then the letters of the alphabet, and afterwards syllables.
Thus the youth miraculously obtained his speech. Moreover, by the saint's
blessing and the remedies prescribed by a physician whom he employed, his head
was entirely healed, and became covered with hair.

Bede also records that John
cured a noblewoman of a pain so grievous that she had been unable to move for
three weeks. Several people who seemed in immediate danger of death were saved
by his prayers. In addition to his own eye-witness accounts, Bede tells us of
cures witnessed by Abbot Bercthun of Beverley and Abbot Herebald of Tinmouth.

After the saint's death,
such miracles continued around his shrine, which became a famous pilgrimage
site. The Bollandist Henschenius devoted four books to the miracles wrought at
the holy bishop's shrine. So many were drawn there that the magnificent
Beverley Minster was built, which rivals some of England's great cathedral
churches. Alcuin also records miracles worked at John's intercession. For
example, King Athelstan invoked John's intercession for victory against the
Scots. In 1307, his relics were translated--the occasion of a vita written by
Folcard. Some of the sweet-smelling relics were discovered in September 1664,
when a grave was being dug, in a lead box within a vault of freestone. These
relics had been hidden in the beginning of the reign of king Edward VI.

It
was not just miracles that led to John's canonization. He led a life of
remarkable holiness. Other devotees include Blessed Julian of Norwich, King
Henry V (who attributed the victory of Agincourt to his intercession), and
Saint John Fisher, who was born at Beverley (Benedictines, Bentley, Farmer,
Gill, Husenbeth, Walsh).